Towards an Authentic Vocal Style and Technique in Late Baroque Performance

Author(s): Antony Ransome

Source: Early Music, Vol. 6, No. 3 (Jul., 1978), pp. 417+419
Published by: Oxford University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3125812
Accessed: 15-04-2020 04:24 UTC

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 tone. We know that large, agile, beauti-
ful voices were quite common in
Towards an authentic vocal style Handel's time (see, for example,
Raguenet, 'Paralldle des Italiens et des
and technique Franqais': Strunk (ed.), Source Readings,
p. 483). In writings from the baroque
period, vibrato is by no means ruled out
in late baroque performance (Praetorius, Syntagma III, Wolfen-
biittel, 1619, p. 231); in fact a freely
resonant voice, capable of the widest
variations in colour and emotional
ANTONY RANSOME
intensity, cannot be without a certain
amount of vibrato-it is built into the
technique. Much reference is made to a
proper balance between chest and head
So far, too little study has beenbut as far back as Caccini, stressresonances (e.g. Pier Francesco Tosi,
evenof
made
the kind of voice which is suitable for
was laid on the importance in arioso Opinioni de' Cantori (Bologna, 1723),
p. 14). Writers such as Tosi, Quantz and
authentic late baroque performance.and aria of stressed syllables being given
Indeed little enough practical use hasthe appropriate musical emphasis, andGiambattista Mancini will have meant

been made by singers of the ideas of by uniting chest voice and head voice
unstressed ones not receiving inappro-
priate ornamentation for example.the
performing style which players of early If ability of the well-trained singer to
instruments now regard as more or lessthe words of any music, baroque or move from one end of his or her range
normal practice. to the other with consistency of timbre,
other, are to move their audience, they
To discuss the second matter first: which can only be achieved, even if what
must clearly be sung with due attention
to their stress and to their mood and
whilst it is clear that, in the early 17th we now call chest voice in women

century, vocal music had primacy over singers is employed, by a continuous

meaning, and it follows that any vocal
solo instrumental music-it was largely use of head resonance, even for the
phrase must be performed in such a way
a matter of fluency and technique-and as to allow the words naturally to lowest notes. When the head and
therefore instrumental melodies tended convey that mood and meaning. Inpharyngeal
a resonances are blended i
to follow vocal patterns and contours, baroque aria with instrumental accom-different amounts, subtly varied resul
by the later 17th century and the firstpaniment, therefore, where an instru-can be obtained, the fullest and
half of the 18th the situation was to brightest tone being achieved by the
mental phrase anticipates an identical
some extent reversed; instruments were most intense use of both resonances (cf
vocal phrase, it will be the respon-
sibility of the instrumentalist(s) toLucie Manen, The Art of Singing
much better designed and could cope
match the phrasing of the singer, (London,
with much more florid writing. For this as 1974), p. 35ff).
demonstrated in rehearsal, always Lucie Manen (ibid) has studied in
reason it is fair to say that any vocal
studies that we make of the period must depth the question of vocal colouring
providing that the singer is aware of the
take account not only of what was and its use in conveying different
overall stylistic needs of the music con-
written at the time on the playingcerned.
of One of the most important moods. of Darker or brighter vocal
these is volume: obviously the singer
instruments, but also of any other aids colouring was achieved by modifica-
to authentic instrumental performancemust tailor his or her volume of delivery tion of the position of the larynx. A
such as slurs and ornamentation that to the volume of the accompanying specific area where little other work has
may (or may not) be written into instruments.
the been done is that of the tone colour
music. The danger is that an instru-To return now to my first statement, which Bach, for example, seems to
mental approach may lose sight of theit is my belief that the bel canto era of require, when, going beyond mere
primary aim of vocal music of the music, commencing just before Caccini demands of form, he moves from one
period, that of the declamation of the
and Peri and including such com- key to another in pursuit of a certain
text, an aim based on Greek precepts posers as Cavalli, Carissimi, A. Scarlatti, mood, always dictated by his text. There
and owing its early growth to CacciniHandel and Bach (not to mention Rossini are instances where after a C minor
and his contemporaries, who acknow- and Donizetti!) implies a certain voice passage, one in A minor can sound
ledged the primacy of the words over production, with a natural, though not positively triumphant, as long as the
the music (Le nuove musiche, Preface large, vibrato, a freedom of resonance, modulation is emphasized by an appro-
(Florence, 1602), para. 2). an ability to colour the voice consider- priate change of vocal colour in line
It has been accepted for a long time
ably as necessary, reserves of volume for with the mood and meaning of the
that sung recitatives should follow the
use where circumstances require it, and words.
natural speech-pattern of the words, without question agility and beauty of Where grace is called for, above all in

417

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the French baroque repertoire, the bel
canto technique as defined above, al-
though developed in Italy, is supremely
capable of achieving French dMlicatesse.
Seventeenth- and 18th-century writers
frequently praised recognized singers
for the charm, beauty and grace of their
soft singing. In fact such a technique
should be able to encompass all the
demands made upon it, from the need
for operatic clarion power (as in many
bass arias fromHandel operas) to the
demands made by chamber cantatas of
the utmost refinement, e.g. those of
Clerambault. Both these requirements
are called for in large measure in an aria
of truly baroque contrasts, that of
Aeolus from Purcell's King Arthur.
I suggest that an authentic perform-
ance of late baroque solo vocal music
will have been achieved when instru-
mental considerations of balance, orna- are competitively priced.
mentation and phrasing are joined by
vocal considerations of vibrancy and Enquiries to:
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419

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